A home for new and unusual music from all corners of the classical genre, brought to you by the power of public media. Second Inversion is a service of Classical KING FM 98.1.
“An event with music, words, and smoke inspired by the optimism and grandeur of the West.”
Photo Credit: Kimberly Chin
Brian Chin has added something unique and fresh to the already forward-thinking music community in Seattle. The Universal Language Project is an innovative concert series rooted in the commissioning and performance of 21st century music and interdisciplinary collaboration.It turns the traditional classical music concert on its head by presenting the music in informal settings, premiering commissioned music by local composers, and collaborating with other art forms. AND! The experience doesn’t stop when the music ends; the audience is encouraged to mingle with the musicians and composers over a glass of wine afterwards to get a personal, inside scoop into the music.
Last season, ULP gave musical birth to works by Sean Osborn, Wayne Horvitz, and Jovino Santos Neto. (You can listen to them on our live concerts page!) Their new season kicks off thisFriday, January 22 at Resonance Hall at SOMA Towers in Bellevue &Saturday, January 23 at Velocity Dance Center in Seattleand features musicians from Inverted Space, the contemporary music ensemble of the University of Washington. The program includes“Campfire Songs” by Brian Cobb (including a commissioned concert overture and a new piece to complete the cycle), “The Lone Ranger,” a theatrical work by Karen Thomas, and the commissioned premiere by young composer Tim Carey.
Second Inversion is proud to be a sponsor of this concert series. We’ll see you there on Saturday, January 23 at Velocity Dance Center!
Second Inversion and the Live Music Project have teamed up to create a monthly, curated concert program insert featuring a list of upcoming contemporary classical, cross-genre, and experimental performances in the Seattle area.
We’ve rallied Seattle-area musicians and presenters to include the sheet below (double-sided when printed) in their concert programs to raise awareness and support of other new music events. We hope this initiative will grow the audiences and create a more centralized network of support for contemporary classical music performed in the Northwest!
Keep an eye out for the inaugural insert in concert programs around Seattle this month. Big thanks to On the Boards, Seattle Pro Musica, The Esoterics, Inverted Space Ensemble, Racer Sessions, and many more for paying it forward last month in December to spread the word about these events taking place in January:
Are you interested in being a part of this initiative? Drop us a line! Full info below with links:
Seattle Composers’ Salon
Informal presentations of finished works, previews, and works in progress by regional composers and performers in a casual setting that allows for experimentation and discussion.
January 8, 8pm, Chapel at the Good Shepherd Center | $5-$15 whateverandeveramen: Burns Night and Drinking Songs
An evening celebrating the poetry of Robert Burns. We will also raise a glass and raise our voices with the singing of traditional drinking songs. Tickets include a free beer.
January 13, 8pm, Naked City Brewery | $10
Inverted Space Ensemble: Earle Brown – A Retrospective
A concert featuring works by American composer Earle Brown, each from each decade of his career including graphic score commissions.
January 19, 7:30pm, Chapel at the Good Shepherd Center | $5-$15
Universal Language Project: The Way West
An event with music, words, and smoke inspired by the optimism and grandeur of the West. Works by Brian Cobb, Karen Thomas, & a commissioned premiere by Tim Carey with guest performers from Inverted Space Ensemble.
Januay 22, 8pm, Resonance at SOMA Towers (Bellevue) | $10-$25
January 23, 8pm, Velocity Dance Center | $10-25
Racer Sessions: CRY & Roar VI
The 6th anniversary festival of the Racer Sessions, a weekly (Sundays, 8-10pm) experimental and improvised music showcase featuring a different artist or group performing original work, followed by a jam session based on the concepts in their opening presentation.
8-10pm, Cafe Racer | FREE
Seattle Philharmonic Orchestra: Four Great Composer-Conductors
Music by Leonard Bernstein and the Northwest premiere of the Symphony No. 1 by Antal Doráti bookend this program of music by composers who were also influential conductors.
2pm, Benaroya Hall
UW Modern Music Ensemble
A performance featuring the “classics” of the modern era and hot-off-the-presses works from the best of today’s composers, including UW faculty and students.
7:30pm, Meany Studio Theatre | $10
Auburn Symphony: A World-Premiere Tribute to Auburn
Hear a world premiere, commissioned by the Seattle Commissioning Club, by Daniel Ott, along with Shostakovich’s Piano Concerto No. 2 (Christina Siemens, piano).
1/30 at 7:30pm & 1/31 at 2:30pm
Auburn Performing Arts Center (Auburn) | $10-$35
Wayward Music Series
Each month, Nonsequitur and like-minded organizations and artists present 10 concerts of contemporary composition, free improvisation, electronic/electroacoustic music, and sound art. Visit waywardmusic.org for dates, times, and artist info.
7:30 or 8pm, Chapel at the Good Shepherd Center | $5-$15
With Seattle’s ever-growing and ever-diversifying population, it’s easy to see why our city has become a top destination for up-and-coming composers, young musical talent, and adventurous concert formats. The 2015-16 season is so packed with new music concerts that, on most weekends, you’d need both hands (and maybe a few toes) to count them. From revitalized Britten to badass multimedia concerts to the classiest Bowie you’ve ever heard, there’s a little something for everyone. Read on for our top picks of the season.
The Town Music series at Town Hall Seattle, curated by our own Artistic Advisor Joshua Roman, is a bastion for cutting-edge music. The season kicks off with a young Russian violinist’s interpretations of Bach’s beautiful, complicated Sonatas and Partitas. And the rest of the season is anything but staid: it includes the premiere of a work composed over two continents, a dynamic performance of Britten’s second string quartet, and a new piece by Roman himself, featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning poetry by Tracy K. Smith and the up-and-coming soprano Jessica Rivera.
Another go-to destination for edgy music with global influences is the UW World Series, an arts season at Meany Hall featuring big names and even bigger ideas. This season is packed with exciting concerts that feature mainstays on the Second Inversion stream. In October, the ETHEL quartet teams up with Native American flutist Robert Mirabal for a concert focused on water’s essential role in all our lives. If drums and mallets are your thing, you must check out So Percussion’s set of modern classics by Reich, Cage, and more. For those who prefer concerts that combine edgy work with timeless pieces, go see the young, bearded Danish String Quartet (they take on music by Beethoven, Schnittke, and a composer from their homeland, Per Nørgaard), pianist Jeremy Denk (he’ll work in some Hindemith and Nancarrow between the Bach and Byrd), or the Daedalus String Quartet (a Huck Hodge world premiere is sandwiched between Beethoven chamber works). If you can’t make it to some of these much-anticipated concerts, don’t worry: we’ll have your back with a live broadcasts or a video from each one.
The UW World Series isn’t the only destination for new music on the University of Washington campus. The School of Music itself has an impressive lineup of concerts. On Halloween weekend, we’re excited to hear the Chicago-based Ensemble Dal Niente perform the works of Seattlites Huck Hodge, Joël-François Durand, and Marcin Pączkowski, among others. In late April, the Carnegie Hall resident ensemble Decoda caps off its weeklong UW residency with a Meany Hall concert of new and old music. And finally, some UW students pay homage to Harry Partch, who created new instruments along with new music, with performances of some of his work.
The UW isn’t the only higher education arts game in town, of course. Cornish College of the Arts is a wealth of compositional talent and its concert season, Cornish Presents, attracts world-class acts every year. Cornish teacher Wayne Horvitz starts off the new-music feast with his piece “Some Places are Forever Afternoon/11 Places for Richard Hugo,” performed with chamber groups Sweeter Than The Day and the Gravitas Quartet. A few days later, flutist Camilla Hoitenga teams up with composer and sound designer Jean-Baptiste Barrière for an electronic concert with video. In December, Paul D. Miller, better known as DJ Spooky, uses interviews from survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs to create a moving original composition. And for an ultimate exploration of music from both sides of the Pacific, stop by PONCHO Hall in November, when a famous gamelan ensemble joins four Seattle string players for a performance of new, local music.
Full-time locavores may not be satisfied until everything about the concert, from composer to performer to creator, is Northwest-based. If you want all local, all the time, your concert season destination should be the Universal Language Project. Founded by trumpeter and composer Brian Chin, the project draws on local talent to present a commissioned premiere in every concert. This season, we’ll hear music inspired by local landscapes written by Karen P. Thomas, Brian Cobb, and Tim Carey; music for strings performed by Seattle-based Scrape Ensemble; and an interactive concert with stunning visuals by Scott Kolbo.
And if that’s not enough to whet your new music appetite, the Seattle Modern Orchestra‘s upcoming season has even more new music. Each of its three main concerts features a premiere of some sort, from Orlando Jacinto Garcia’s From Darkness to Luminosity to an as-yet-unnamed work by Ewa Trębacz to the U.S. premiere of Anthony Cheung’s 2011 work Discrete Infinity.
In the last few years, Benaroya Hall has become an internationally recognized center for cutting-edge new music, from the avant garde to the crossover. If you’re into the former, you probably already know about the Seattle Symphony’s famed [untitled] series, which takes place in the Benaroya lobby fashionably late at night. This [untitled] season proves it means business with a season kickoff made up entirely of world premieres, then goes on to focus on New York City’s avant garde scene and an Arctic-themed piece by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer John Luther Adams. If the latter is more your taste, check out the undefinable Sonic Evolution series, which this season focuses on the way different artists influence each other across genres and the phenomenon of indie music and film.
Finally, if you’re looking to get some culture but indulge in musical guilty pleasures at the same time, your go-to season should be the Seattle Rock Orchestra‘s. The ensemble that famously covers popular music on orchestral instruments has put together a killer 2015-16 series, which includes a David Bowie showcase, a collection of Mowtown music, and an evening devoted to Neil Diamond. A quintet from SRO also closes out Classical KING FM’s inaugural concert series with a very exciting Eastside concert featuring covers of Beck, Bjork, Radiohead, and more.
These are only a few highlights from an expansive, diverse, and exciting upcoming concert season. For a full listing of shows around the Northwest that’ll make you rethink classical, check our full event calendar.
The word stimmung is German for “tuning”—but it applies to much more than just pitch. While it may be used to describe the tuning of instruments or voices, it can also be used to describe the tuning of a group of people, or the inward tuning of one’s soul.
“Stimmung” is also the title of German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen’s 70-minute sonic meditation for six amplified voices. This week, vocalists from the Inverted Space Ensemble will perform “Stimmung” as part of their “Long Piece Fest” (the name is pretty self-explanatory).
The piece was among the first major Western works to use vocal overtones as a key element of composition—in fact, the entire piece is based on the overtones of a low B-flat. The work was inspired by Stockhausen’s visit to the Mayan ruins in Mexico, and it features a recounting of ancient gods along with some of his own poetry.
Russian composer Igor Stravinsky is best known for his three major ballets: “The Firebird,” “Petrushka,” and “The Rite of Spring”—but his smaller-scale theatrical works are just as striking. This weekend, the Universal Language Project is presenting Stravinsky’s “The Soldier’s Tale,” an hour-long dramatic work based on a Russian folk tale.
The music is scored for very unique instrumentation: a septet of violin, double bass, clarinet, bassoon, cornet, trombone, and percussion. The story is told by four characters: the soldier, the devil, the narrator, and the princess (who is portrayed by a silent dancer). The libretto recounts the tale of a soldier who trades his fiddle to the devil for wealth, only to realize that his greed has led him to unimaginable loss.
The program will also feature a performance of Brazilian composer and pianist Jovino Santos Neto’s “Saci,” a theatrical work scored for seven musicians, narrator, and dance. The work tells the story of Saci, a mythological (and often mischievous) character of Brazilian folklore who is a combination of different cultural strains, including Native Brazilian tribes, African slaves, and Portuguese colonizers.
What do Edgar Allan Poe, orangutans, and cyber-ant goddesses have in common? They’re all part of Concert Imaginaire’s upcoming music performance, “Another Day in Suck City.”
Don’t let the name fool you—“Another Day in Suck City” is anything but your typical music performance. Concert Imaginaire will be performing musical settings of poetry by Emily Dickinson and Edgar Allan Poe, a dance for an orangutan, the premiere of “Just a Kiss Away” (a 5-minute opera about love and war), and so much more.
Concert Imaginaire is comprised of music director and guitarist David Hahn, violinist Ruthie Dornfeld, keyboardist Jay Kenney, and percussionist Becca Baggenstoss. This performance will also feature guest vocalists Katie Weld, Sid Law, and Gabriel Tachell, along with video accompaniment created by Leo Mayberry.
The performance is this Saturday, May 16 at 8 p.m. at the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford.
This week’s concert calendar has everything from Croatian cello rock stars to traditional Celtic music! TORCH at the Good Shepherd Center
As the great 20th century German novelist Thomas Mann once said, “Art is the sacred torch that must shed its merciful light into all life’s terrible depths.” And it is precisely this mantra from which the contemporary music quartet TORCH gets its name. This weekend, the fiery foursome is blazing through Seattle to perform an evening of hot new music
Composed of clarinetist Eric Likkel, trumpeter Brian Chin, vibist/percussionist Ben Thomas, and bassist Brady Millard-Kish, the group’s compositions artfully merge elements of progressive jazz, post-rock, and contemporary classical to create a one-of-a-kind sound rooted in groovy melodies and bluesy harmonic backdrops.
TORCH is performing this Friday, March 13 at 8 p.m. in the Chapel Performance Space at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford. 2CELLOS at the Moore Theatre
Young Croatian cellists Luka Šulić and Stjepan Hauser are not afraid to break a few bow hairs. The two play with infectious energy, incredible technical prowess, and utterly captivating stage presence—proving that classically-trained musicians can still be total rock stars.
Better known as 2CELLOS, the duo rose to fame in 2011 when their version of Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal” became a YouTube sensation. (Seriously, watch that video—it’s unbelievable.) But it’s not all just classic pop covers: their amazingly diverse repertoire ranges from the Baroque beauty of Bach and Vivaldi to the rebellious rock and roll of AC/DC and everything in between.
2CELLOS is performing this Saturday, March 14 at the Moore Theatre. Doors open at 7 p.m. and the performance begins at 8 p.m. Earl’s Chair: Celtic & Baroque Music
Nothing says St. Patrick’s Day quite like traditional Celtic music. This Tuesday, celebrate the patron saint of Ireland with Earl’s Chair as they perform a concert filled with Celtic and Baroque music from Ireland, Scotland, and New England.
Earl’s Chair is comprised of violinist, oboist, and countertenor Michael Albert and harpsichordist and organist Henry Lebedinsky. Their shared love of Celtic music from a variety of traditions and time periods brought them together nearly 20 years ago, and now they’re coming to Seattle to share with you an evening of tunes, songs, and stories both old and new from the charming Celtic tradition.
The concert is this Tuesday, March 17 at Naked City Brewery and Taphouse at 7 p.m.
